We’ve been keeping an eye out waiting for this change as we had a feeling it was coming……HURRAH!!

Within Facebook Group settings, a new option has popped up for group owners that enables them to “allow Pages to request to join as group members.” Previously, only personal profiles could join Facebook Groups and post and comment within them.

We think this is great news for businesses as you can now interact as your page and not ‘you’ which means your brand recognition will be strengthened and you can keep your personal profiles even more separate from your business, if you wish.

You’ll know if a group has ‘ticked’ this box because you will see an icon in the bottom right asking you if you want to interact as you or your page. Just click on it to change the option.

See the picture below for how this looks.

Remember it is down to the group to change the setting so if you really want to interact with a group, as a page, why not let them know. If you’re an admin of a group you’ll find the option in the group settings.

Many of our clients have been receiving emails from Facebook stating, “We want to let you know that your Page’s template will be changing.” Remember you are in control of how your page looks. If you ignore these emails, your page will automatically change (and you will be given a date when this will happen). You can change to the recommended template immediately, by clicking on “Learn More” or you can keep your existing template under page settings. However, we recommend changing your template as Facebook is giving you the chance to let potential customers know more about your business e.g. if you are a restaurant you can showcase your menus, if you are a shop you can direct people to make a purchase.

According to Facebook, the new templates are the result of people and businesses wanting “easier and faster ways to connect with each other.” They go on to say, “Relevant information such as hours, price range and recommendations are prioritised so people can easily take action, like placing an order or contacting you directly.” Facebook again says that the new page layouts have the aim of seeing better engagement with consumers by “showcasing important information specific to each page’s industry.”

One of the bigger changes that we can see so far is that in the new templates, action buttons will be featured near the top of the page, encouraging users to ‘do something’– so whether that is booking an appointment, placing an order, purchasing online etc will depend on what you offer and the options will depend on the template chosen.

If you’re an admin on Facebook, you will likely get an email soon (if you haven’t already) prompting you to switch your current Facebook page to one of the new templates. We recommend you activate the change. Simply click on the “Learn More” link in the email and then when you get to the page, click the “Apply Template Now” button.

If you have not received an email about the changes simply log on to your page, click on settings, click on edit page and you’ll see the templates there.

Facebook will inform you what your current template is, and which one they recommend for your page. PLEASE NOTE if you don’t change it yourself, Facebook will automatically select a template they think is best suited for your brand at the end of August 2018.

No matter which template you select, you still have the option to customize the order of the tabs, and choose which ones are visible to users by going to Settings, Edit Page. So these changes don’t mean you’ll lose control of how your Facebook page looks, you will just have to spend a little bit of time tweaking it.

The templates available are:

Standard– This is what most pages are currently. Through this update Facebook is tending to prompt you to select a more specific template below.

Services– designed to help people find your services and get in touch. (THIS IS THE TEMPLATE WE HAVE CHOSEN FOR ONE TO THREE).

Business– designed to help you manage your business, including areas for special offers and job postings.

Shopping– designed to showcase products and make it easy for people to shop online.

Video page– designed to highlight video content on your page.

Simply pick the template that is the best match for your business.

As always – our advice, whatever the template you’re using, is to keep your page fresh with engaging content, imagery and video and think about who your audience is. Speak to them, don’t sell to them and enjoy Facebook for the marketing resource it is.

The algorithm changes to Facebook have, pretty much across the board, seen a reduction in reach. Whilst engaging content, some targeted boosts and use of video and imagery can help to increase reach, Facebook stories are another ‘free’ method of doing this and they’re currently not used widely so it’s a great time to get started.

If you want to get your business in front of your audience and be one of the first to adopt this method of reaching your audience, read on!

Stories appear at the top of users’ Facebook News Feed on both desktop and the mobile app (picture here is on desktop) so you’ll be ‘front and centre’ with your message.

Just like Instagram Stories, Facebook Stories are visual rather than text-based (although you can do a ‘stylised text option) and they can contain multiple photos and videos.

They will disappear in 24 hours.

As I write this, business pages can only post Stories using the mobile app, not from desktop – so first things first – download the Facebook app (not the Pages app, just Facebook) if you haven’t already and it seems that if a page is managed in Business Manager stories don’t work.

Good posts and good stories aren’t always the same! Stories tend to lend themselves better to behind-the-scenes content don’t need ‘professional’ photography, necessarily. The nature of a story is to be ‘in the moment’ and unique and something of a journey for your audience.

Here are a few tips on creating a good Story.

Plan out a few ‘storyboards’

For example, if you’re a beautician you might want to show a before, during and after manicure.

A PT might like to share a few shots from a bootcamp session.

Can you go ‘behind the scenes’ in your story.

This can be something as simple as your lunchbreak, your daily walk, your arrival at a meeting – think about creating personality with these stories.

Stories can be a great place for delivering tips

Five top tips on how to create the perfect healthy lunch or 3 tweaks to your LinkedIn profile that will help you to reach more people. You can use visuals for this but also write text over them in the app.

Stories let you use text and stickers

Do use them so you can have some fun too!

How to create Facebook Stories

Through the Facebook app on your phone, you can directly post Stories by:

Going to your business page

Scroll down to where you see ‘Your Page’s Story’

Click ‘Create a Story’

Create your Story by taking photos or video, or upload photos and video from your Camera Roll

You can add filters and text

Once you’re done, at the bottom of your screen, click the ‘Next’ button

You will be prompted to add it as a Story, or as a post to your page

Select “Your Page’s Story” and click the arrow button at the bottom

It’s as easy as that!

Currently there isn’t any ‘formal’ way of measuring Facebook stories but we suspect as they grow in popularity they will be added to the Facebook Insights dashboard – we’ll keep an eye on this and let you know!

Facebook is often in the news – profits made, fake news, social responsibilities…..but in recent days it has hit the headlines with BIG changes that will affect your business. We’ve spent some time researching what these changes mean to businesses and now share our thoughts.

Mark Zuckerberg is keen to take Facebook ‘back to it’s roots’ of connecting individuals.

Zuckerberg has said: “We built Facebook to help people stay connected and bring us closer together with the people that matter to us. That’s why we’ve always put friends and family at the core of the experience. Research shows that strengthening our relationships improves our well-being and happiness. But recently we’ve gotten feedback from our community that public content – posts from businesses, brands and media – is crowding out the personal moments that lead us to connect more with each other.”
You can read his full statement from 12th January 2018 here.

Essentially Facebook has seen that more and more people are scanning their newsfeed but not interacting and Facebook believes this is because newsfeeds are saturated with business posts and not posts from ‘friends.’

Here’s what’s changing

The newsfeed that you navigate to automatically when you log on will now include posts from people that “matter” to you. This could be friends and family, posts from groups, and business pages BUT only if your community (i.e. your friends and family) are engaging with those posts. This means that business pages are likely to see organic post reach dwindle even further. We’ve always advised our clients that content and engagement are so important when it comes to social media (and all things to do with digital marketing). However, this is now more important than ever.

Here’s our tips on what to do!

Consider content

The new algorithm says it will give priority to “community” posts that encourage communication and discussion.

Think about discussion topics that can relate to your business.

What questions can you ask?

Sell, sell, sell simply won’t cut it any more.

What will make people enagage? This relates to content but also asking people to check in and write reviews.

What are your audience interested in and likely to engage with?

Think ‘fun’ – what will make people laugh and respond?

Run competitions.

Post events as separate ‘events’ rather than just a post with a date, so people can express an interest or show they are attending your event.

Schedule in Facebook only

There has always been debate over whether post reach is limited if using an external scheduling tool but with these changes it is now ‘fact not fiction’ that using Hootsuite or any other tools will penalise your posts.

Facebook’s inbuilt scheduler is easy to use so…..start using it!

Create a group

Groups will be given more priority than business pages so think about setting up a group for your content BUT remember that the content should not be all about selling, it’s still important to abide by the new rules and engage. One thing to consider is not to brand a group with your business name. For example if you are a beautician you could call your group “Top beauty tips”, a car leasing company could be “All you need to know about leasing a car.” Immediately these groups are telling your audience what you are going to help them with not what you are selling.

Advertise

Facebook are essentially saying businesses need to start paying if they want to advertise their business and for some time we have been sharing with our clients that a Facebook ad budget is a necessity but now the message is if you’re not willing to advertise Facebook is not the platform for you.

Boosted posts, carousel ads, video and image ads all work well – so use them!

Our final thoughts

This isn’t the end of the world for businesses that use Facebook but it is a big change. We will be speaking directly to each of our clients to discuss the way forward for their Facebook strategy and for some it may mean that Facebook is no longer at the top of the list of their social media must haves.

Other platforms – LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram to name just a few – exist and let’s not forget good old ‘off line’ marketing. If you’d like any advice please get in touch.

Facebook has added what we think is a nifty new tool for admins of Facebook groups. You can now ask up to three questions for people requesting to join the Group.

For example, if your group is related to a school and you only want parents, you can ask what year the child is in. If it’s a business networking group, you can ask which meeting location they are a member of. We think this is a great way to screen members with a bit more detail and ensure they’re the right fit for the group.

It may also help to ensure people aren’t joining groups just to ‘spam’

The answers and questions will only be seen by admins and moderators (don’t worry, no answers will be posted to the group).

If you’re managing a Facebook community, it’s also a good opportunity to ask about your audience’s interests and expectations, so that you can plan you future content within the group.

To set these questions up just:

log into Facebook

go to ‘edit group settings’ – by clicking on the … icon next to the ‘share’ button

For all you Facebook fans, we are sure that you’ve noticed the relatively new Facebook Live button. We’ve seen a few live videos and would like to share our top tips!

What is Facebook Live?

Facebook Live is a video tool which allows you to share live videos with your followers.

On your smartphone, simply tap on “Publish”:

Then select “Live video”:

Ensure you allow microphone access – you will be prompted to do this the first time you use Facebook Live. You need to go to your settings, click on Privacy and click on Microphone and ensure you have a green setting on Facebook.

When you start recording, there will be a red icon at the top left-hand corner of the video indicating that it is a live video. The word “Live” is written next to the icon, along with the number of current viewers.

Videos will appear in News Feed and on the broadcaster’s Page or profile while they are live. Once a broadcast has ended, live videos are eligible to show up everywhere that other videos appear. Did you know that Facebook Live videos are more likely to appear higher in News Feed when those videos are actually live, compared to after they are no longer live?

A live video can be up to 90 minutes, but we recommend short, sharp bursts of information.If you are considering the use of video as part of your marketing mix, then you should consider using the Facebook Live tool.

Top Tips

So you are ready to get started! Here are some of our top tips:

Ensure your microphone setting is switched on (we’ve seen a few silent videos)!

Consider your background and motion – you don’t want to make your viewers feel sea-sick with too much movement!

Consider your facial expressions, especially when stopping and starting – better still get somebody to record the Live Video for you.

Practice your key message and the language you are going to use before you start filming.

Don’t use this tool for the sake of it – have something to show or demonstrate e.g. a short make up lesson or the way to wear the latest accessory would be perfect.

PLAN! – Let people know beforehand that you will be live at a certain time, so they will be online to watch you. Pick a time when your audience is mainly online (you can get this information from your Facebook Insights).

Use “a hook” to encourage people to “tune in” e.g. at 8pm tonight I’ll be announcing my latest special offer for the first 50 customers etc.

If you have any questions or if you have any other tips to share from your experience, we’d love to hear from you! Happy Facebook videoing!

In a digital world where we all seem to be more available and some consumers expect a 24 hour service, it’s important to remember that we can’t all be on social media all of the time. Perhaps we are in meetings, dealing with clients or actually taking some time off. So if somebody sends a private message to your Facebook business page, how can you let them know that although you’re not available at the moment, their message is important to you and you will get back to them as soon as you can? The answer is to set up an Instant Reply on Facebook Messenger!

Here’s how:

Instant Replies are messages sent automatically as your Page’s first response to new messages. For example, you can use your Instant Reply message to let customers know that you’ll get back to them soon or to thank them for contacting your Page.

It’s a good idea to set an expectation of when you’ll be in touch e.g. “Thank you for your message, a member of our team will be in touch within 24 hours. Please note this inbox is not manned continuously after 6pm or at weekends.”

Who knows how important that message could be? – It might be a potential new client, it might be an urgent question. By setting the expectation of when you’ll be in touch, you are providing a professional and informative response. It’s OK to have the night off Facebook – Your Instant Reply has it covered and you can deal with the message at a time to suit you!